Interview with Greg Stimac

Greg Stimac is a Chicago-based artist who currently whose solo exhibition of work is currently on view at White Flag Projects. Below is an interview I did with Greg, where he discusses his artistic process, the White Flag show, and some of the themes that recur in his work.

Lynna Borden: I’m interested in the idea of the photographs depicting dead bugs accumulated on small Plexiglas sheets attached to your car. Can you discuss the origins of this project and where these works fit into your oeuvre?

Greg Stimac: Three years ago, I was with my friend Billy Joyce in Portland, Oregon. We had just driven up from Oakland, California and the front of my car was covered with bugs and dirt from the drive. We taped some pieces of mat board to my bumper and drove to Chicago. Most of the debris just flaked off by the time we arrived and we forgot about it. After some time I started thinking about how to bring that idea into photography. I settled on using Plexiglas sheets fastened to the grill with bailing wire.

Untitled (Chicago to Memphis to Little Rock) was the first one made in the series. Arriving in Little Rock at night I pulled over, removed the Plexi, connected a flatbed scanner to my cigarette lighter and made a scan at roadside with the lid of the scanner removed making the background of the image black. It worked out that the black of the image was actually the dark of the night sky.

I enjoyed making photographs that were composed by driving and the road itself, and not really knowing what imagery would emerge. All I could control was the time of night/day, season and rate of speed. I imagined the process to be somewhat akin to the collodion process of old, where the photographer coated their glass plates, photographed and developed in the field.

LB: Travel and cars, specifically, are featured directly or indirectly in many of your artworks, including most of the work in the White Flag show. Would you discuss how the automobile figures into your process as both a means of production and as a motif?

GS: To me the car is just as important an instrument as the camera. I often make work that features automobiles and the road because it is something very present and close to me, it has become part of my lifestyle.

LB: Do you think being a first-generation American has much to do with your perspective on American culture?

GS: Not so much. I was born and raised in Ohio (the heart if it all).

LB: Do you consider your work to be documentary or autobiographical in any way?

GS: I think about documentary photography and the work may have some documentary attributes, but often in more of a ridiculous, mundane, and playful way such as in the series’ Bottle of Piss and Mowing the Lawn.

LB: Do you think road photography and other road narratives as an inherently masculine subject? Do you ever consider your work as being gendered in any meaningful way?

GS: History shows us many woman photographers who engage in this mode of photography. Dorothea Lange for one.

LB: Is your work dependent upon being American and in America?

GS: It’s where I live and work right now. I can’t tell what I’d be making if I lived elsewhere, but why would I? America is a fascinating place.

LB: Do you see your work as any kind of critical commentary on American culture?

GS: I suppose at times certain works carry those layers more than others, such as Bison Silhouette, which is represented in the White Flag show. I had been thinking about the vast herds of bison that had once roamed the Great Plains and the West, now absent except places such as Yellowstone National Park and the occasional meat ranch. I came across this black rusting metal cutout of a bison positioned in the landscape along Hwy 20 in the Methow Valley in north central Washington state, and to me it sadly represented that negative space.

LB: The work in the White Flag exhibition was made over the last several years. Is there anything you’re working on currently that you can discuss?

GS: I’d like to do some aerial video work this summer.

Greg Stimac is on view through May 22, 2010. For more information on this exhibition and upcoming events, please visit www.whiteflagprojects.org.

-Lynna Borden, Intern

• Art Organization: White Flag Projects

Greg Stimac at White Flag Projects

White Flag Projects is pleased to announce the opening of a solo exhibition of artwork by Greg Stimac, which will take place this Saturday, April 24th from 7-10 p.m.

In the summer of 2009, Chicago-based photographer Greg Stimac set out on a cross-country road trip with a sheet of Plexiglas adhered to the front of his car. Each time Stimac stopped and set out toward a new destination, he attached a fresh sheet of Plexi, removed the old one, and scanned it to make a printed image of the smashed insect carcasses and other debris collected on the plastic surface. Not your typical roadside activity (plugging a flatbed scanner into your car’s cigarette lighter and creating art) but each image turned out strikingly beautiful. The flattened bodies of insects, flecks of dirt, and other airborne particles transform from waste into constellation-like collages against a stark black background. Each image in the series, though similar in terms of theme and material, has its own distinct pattern and character. The works stand as documents of Stimac’s journeys, evidencing the conditions he encountered as he traveled.

Continuing in the tradition of the American road narrative, Stimac also takes photographs along the way; however, he doesn’t capture images of the stunning scenery or historic sights. Instead, he serially documents the arguably more mundane traces of human life such as bottles of piss that litter the side of the road. This series of works, titled only by their location will also be on view at White Flag alongside a video of Stimac’s, showcasing three identical white Mustangs wearing out their horns in an atonal chorus.

Most of Stimac’s work focuses on the American cultural landscape. Whether it is the mowing of lawns in suburbia, lone campfires against the Pacific, or a group ready to fire at a shooting range, Stimac’s work sheds light on American identities and ideologies that are too easily forgotten by mainstream culture.

Greg Stimac opens Saturday, April 24th, 2010. The opening reception will take place between 7 and 10 PM. The exhibition will remain open through May 22nd. For more information on this exhibition and upcoming events, please visit www.whiteflagprojects.org.